falling on my face.

Consider this your warning as I am just now beginning to acknowledge that this is my curse/gift.

I hurt people unintentionally. A lot. When I think I’m being funny, or ironic, or helpful it turns out that I’m only causing another person grief and heartache. I’d like to say it’s only happened once. But it’s happend a lot. Everytime I learn. But I wish I could have learned enough the first time to keep it from happening ever again.

But alas every person is different.

Therefore falling on my face each time is a wretchedly new experience.

And no matter how things are resolved I always feel as though I have this poorly patched crack that everyone is watching, waiting for it to fall apart again.

There was a time I was spiteful, vengeful and just plain mean. I hurt people and I hurt them on purpose, I didn’t care.

(I call this era B.C., or “before Cody”)

But P.C. (post Cody) I’m a little more human. And have become more and more so as the years have gone by. I have sought out those who I was nasty to in my B.C. life and offered apologies. People I hurt deserved them and I knew that I needed to come clean to be able to start anew.

And yet here I am. Still hurting people when I don’t mean to.

I have been very ugly in the past year about pregnancy. It has been brought to my attention multiple times. And everytime I feel horrible. But to everyone I hurt? It’s my own thing. It’s nothing against you. And I’m sorry that I lashed out at you the way I did.

I’m on a very confusing road and somedays are worse than others. I’m sorry if I cross paths with you on those bad days. But I promise. It’s me. Not you. And I am getting better.

In May I wrote a fairly ugly post about infertility. One of the uglier ones I’ve written. But it got all of that ugliness out of me and put it out there on display. And I’ve felt much better since. It hurts when people say “I’m pregnant, but I was afraid to tell you.” I don’t even know why that hurts. But it does. My own personal battles aren’t going to leave me any less happy for you. I want you to enjoy your pregnancy. I want to know about your heartburn and vomit. Really.

What hurts more is when I find out through the grapevine. It is obvious that I am having severe problems conceiving. People around me know that. In many situations I feel like the big giant infertile elephant in a room full of fluffy humpy bunnies. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate it when someone admits to me that they are pregnant, before the word hits the street. Call me selfish. But it helps a lot to be able to have that private moment with someone, to see how excited they are. To be excited with them. I’ve kept many secrets of pregnancies around me.

But when a new pregnancy is being discussed and the conversation shuts down as soon as I walk by? I feel as though my freak flag is flying. I’m not dumb. I know what you’re talking about.

To those of you who may have friends struggling with infertility that find themselves pregnant? Tell them. In person. On the phone. However you communicate the most naturally. Have them at the top of your list of people to tell. We can keep secrets. We want so desperately to be happy for you but it’s hard when we’re the last ones to know because you didn’t want to upset us.

When we take our kids to see fireworks we warn them that it is going to get loud so when the big booms do come, they don’t come as a surprise.

A lot of times we don’t tell our kids something before going into it for fear that we will scare them before anything even happens. Generally you don’t go to a mall walk your kid straight up to Santa and plunk them down in his lap. You warm them up to the idea. Let them get used to it.

This is longer than I wanted it to be. And I got off topic. Sorry.

I’m imperfect.

And I hate myself for that sometimes.

I hate that I can hurt other people so badly without meaning to.

I hate that I even have the capacity to hurt someone.

Especially those that mean the most to me.

No related posts.

Comments

Dude, I totally get it. Two weeks after I miscarried our first baby I found out that my sister-in-law was prego and then a week later? My best friend. For a minute I was all HOW DARE YOU (be pregnant, be happy, TELL ME, etc) but then I realized that life goes on for others even when I am stuck down in the trench and yes, it sucks, but it’s good too. It gets your head out of your butt a little bit, maybe? Sorta? I don’t know. Totally feel you, though.

Honestly? That ‘mean’ post you refer to got me through a rough patch i was dealing with at the time, about the exact same problem. I think you’re allowed to be angry, especially to things that suck, like infertility. Letting yourself be angry makes you whole; blogging about it gives the rest of us freedom to be angry too.
So I hope you keep writing posts like that one. For me, anyway. Because you know you blog purely for my tastes…!

This blog brought a tear to my eye. I am not infertile (well at least I don’t think so), but I have been a divorced mom to a 4-yr- old (also a curly-haired blonde girly) for the past three plus years and am over 30. I so desperately want another child and it hurts to see so many of my friends getting pregnant and having babies while I flouder in singledom (it also hurts to see them getting married and buying houses too, but that’s a whole ‘nother issue). I want to do this whole having kids thing with the right person the second time around (and maybe third or more), but I’m so afraid that by the time I find that right person it will be too late. Going now before I cry more….Anyway, thanks for your viewpoint.

I do the same thing. It’s so awful, being such a clod. That’s what it’s like, it’s like being this big huge terrifying creature that doesn’t even understand it’s own size and strength and then constantly squashing the tiny creatures it wants to be friends with instead of… wow, crappy metaphor.

Anyways, I can relate and it sucks. Add to that my problems of long-windedness and my habit of making everything about me without realizing it, oh, and the belief that my opinion must be shared and I must share it LOUDLY until people feel as though I have ATTACKED them (their words, not mine) over something as inane as recent research on the effects of TV on toddler brains, it’s a wonder that I have any friends at all.

Here’s hoping something clicks and we find a way to be a little gentler with our peeps.